Emil Clemens Horst (18 March 1867 – 24 May 1940)[1] was a major figure in the cultivation, harvest and sale of hops in the United States.

[1] In the mid 1880s he purchased a small plot of land along the Bear River, near Wheatland, California, and began cultivating hops.

[3][4] By 1898, Horst's operation had grown to the point that ten hop drying kilns ran daily during the harvest[2]: 29  and a company town, large enough to have its own post office, was started on the ranch to support the thousands of migrant workers who picked the mature hops each year.

By 1912, Horst owned the largest number of acres of hops under cultivation in the world with offices in Chicago, New York and London.

When the separator proved itself and the pickers were told that there would be no work, the workers went on strike and blocked access to the kilns, halting the harvest.

[11][12] He died 24 May 1940 in his home at 31 Presidio Terrace in San Francisco, and was buried at Olivet Memorial Park in Colma, California.